At first glance, this seems a bit confusing: five months after launch, the spacecraft named Juice had traveled 370 million kilometers, which is only 5% of its journey to Jupiter.
To explain the extended time, the European Space Agency outlined the science of flight dynamics and orbital mechanics.
A complex planetary dance
Every celestial body in our universe – planet, moon, star, or galaxy – orbits another entity.
The Earth orbits the Sun at a speed of 30 km/s. When a spacecraft is launched from our planet, it inherits this orbital energy, effectively placing it in the same orbit around the Sun as Earth.
Challenge for Juice
One might assume that the most efficient route to Jupiter would be a straight path, but this approach has its own challenges.
Not only would this require a huge amount of fuel to propel the spacecraft in that direction, but a larger reserve of fuel would also be needed to slow down and orbit Jupiter upon arrival, so that the spacecraft doesn’t overshoot its target.
Moving targets
The Earth and Jupiter, in their eternal celestial journey around the Sun, constantly change their position relative to each other.
The distance varies, reaching a maximum of 968 million kilometers and a minimum of just under 600 million.
Given this constant motion, it would be impossible to point a spacecraft directly at Jupiter.
Instead, flight engineers had to anticipate where Jupiter would be when the spacecraft arrived.
“All planets move at different speeds in their orbits around the Sun,” says ESA.
“Imagine throwing a ball at a moving target from a moving vehicle. Engineers must calculate the ideal time to make a jump on a circular path from Earth’s orbit to where Jupiter will be when the spacecraft arrives, not where it will be when the spacecraft leaves Earth.”
Flyover mission
Historically, missions such as Voyager, Pioneer, and New Horizons managed to reach Jupiter in less than two years.
However, these missions are simply flybys, using Jupiter as a gravitational slingshot to another destination.
Energy and mass
To maintain its presence around Jupiter, the approach would have to be slower.
The mass of the spacecraft plays an important role here. More mass means more fuel, which in turn affects launch complexity. Juice, which weighs more than 6,000 kg, is one of the heaviest interplanetary probes to date.
Even with the enormous power of the Ariane 5 rocket, a direct pass to Jupiter within two years is not possible.
The solution lies in gravity assist or flyby maneuvers. This maneuver exploits the gravitational pull of celestial bodies to increase the spacecraft’s speed, a cosmic dance that trades energy between the spacecraft and the planet.
Energy trading
Juice’s itinerary includes a series of flybys involving the Earth, Moon and Venus. This maneuver would put it in line for a major encounter with the Jovian system in July 2031.
The journey, filled with an unprecedented 35 flybys of Jupiter’s moon, will end with Juice entering Ganymede’s orbit, marking a historical first for humanity.
Precise maneuvers
But the complex space choreography is not without challenges. Every maneuver must be precise.
Even the slightest miscalculation could cause the probe to be lost in space or require a large amount of fuel to correct its course.
The main goal of Juice’s mission is to study the oceans that could potentially harbor life beneath the icy surfaces of Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto.
Through this major exploration, insights into the formation of planets and moons in the universe can be gained.
For the latest information, you can follow the mission’s progress on Twitter via @ESAJuiceBar.
Image Credit: ESA
—-
Visit us at EarthSnap, the free app brought to you by Eric Ralls and Earth.com.
2023-10-22 08:43:47
#trip #Jupiter #long #Earth.com #SurabayaPostKota.net
